Taxable sales
If you are registered for GST – or required to be – the goods and services you sell in Australia are generally taxable unless they are GST-free or input-taxed.
To be a taxable sale (that is, a sale that has GST in the price), a sale must be:
You pay GST on the taxable sales you make when you lodge your activity statement.
For these taxable sales, you:
- include GST in the price
- issue a tax invoice to the buyer
- pay the GST you've collected when you lodge your activity statement.
You can claim credits for the GST included in the price of purchases you needed to make your taxable sales.
Partly taxable sales
If your sale can be separated into identifiable parts and any of those parts are GST-free or input-taxed, the sale is partly taxable. You only need to pay GST on the taxable part of the sale.
Capital assets
Sales of business assets such as office equipment and motor vehicles are usually taxable sales. GST also applies to business assets you trade in or otherwise dispose of by transferring ownership.
See also
Sales for payment
For a sale to be taxable, it must be made for payment. This is usually monetary but can be another form of payment, such as:
- goods or services provided instead of money, such as barter transactions
- payment in the form of refraining from doing something.
See also
Sales in the course of operating your business
For a sale to be taxable, you must provide the goods or services as part of conducting your business. This includes all sales of business assets, including items such as motor vehicles and office plant and equipment. It also includes things done in the course of setting up or winding down your business.
Sales connected with Australia
GST applies to sales that are connected with Australia, whether they are goods, property or other things.
Goods
A sale of goods is connected with Australia if the goods are any of the following:
- delivered or made available in Australia to the purchaser
- removed from Australia
- brought to Australia – provided the seller either imports the goods or installs or assembles the goods in Australia.
- from 1 July 2018, supplies of low value imported goods to a consumer in Australia
Exports of goods and services from Australia are generally GST-free, even though the sale is connected with Australia. For more information, see Exports; GST on low value imported goods
Property
A sale of property is connected with Australia if the property is in Australia. For GST purposes property includes:
- land
- land and buildings
- interest in land
- rights over land
- a licence to occupy land.
Things other than goods or property
A sale of something other than goods or property is connected with Australia if any of the following applies:
- the thing is done in Australia
- the seller makes the sale through a business they carry on in Australia
- the sale is of a right or option to purchase something that would be connected with Australia.
- the purchaser of the sale is an Australian consumer.
See also
- GST-free sales
- Input-taxed sales
- GSTR 2018/1– Goods and Services Tax: supplies of real property connected with the indirect tax zone (Australia)
- GSTR 2018/2 – Goods and Services Tax: supplies of goods connected with the indirect tax zone (Australia)
- GSTR 2019/1 – Goods and Services Tax: supply of anything other than goods or real property connected with the indirect tax zone (Australia)
- GST definitions
Taxable sales are sales that have GST in the price and must be for payment made in the course of operating your business and connected with Australia.